


The Sweet Season

by lauawill



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:15:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27887380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauawill/pseuds/lauawill
Summary: Kathryn hosts a cookie exchange with an ulterior motive.
Relationships: Chakotay/Kathryn Janeway
Comments: 44
Kudos: 179
Collections: 25 Days of Voyager (2020 Version)





	The Sweet Season

**Author's Note:**

> This story covers no new ground and is riddled with cliches. It's also unbetaed, and in fact written over the course of a single afternoon when I was supposed to be writing marketing materials for Medicare Supplement Insurance. But it's sweet and light, and I hope you enjoy it anyway.

The Sweet Season

December 4, 2020

“Admit it. You’re only doing this because you can’t bake.”

“That’s not true.” Kathryn gave her sister a glare that had quelled both wily Kazons and wayward pilots.

Phoebe only snorted and handed over the box of goodies she’d brought from her house across town. “No, really,” she insisted. “I’ve seen the horrible things you’ve done to the simplest of biscuits. What prompted you to host a cookie exchange is beyond me.”

Kathryn rolled her eyes. She craned her neck to give Phoebe’s husband Frank an affectionate kiss on the cheek, then turned to her niece and nephew. “Naomi and T’Meni will be here soon. There are warm cookies by the tree. Take one each, and then go see what’s for you in the yard.” Katie and Liam bolted for the back of the house, while Kathryn headed for the kitchen, leaving Phoebe and Frank behind in the front hall to hang up their parkas.

“I’m having a cookie exchange because cookies know no denomination,” Kathryn called over her shoulder. “My crew is a mixed bag. We celebrate Christmas, the Parises celebrate Christmas, the Kims celebrate Christmas. But the Wildmans celebrate both Hanukkah and Ktarian holidays. Noah Lessing marks Kwanzaa. Tuvok and T’Pel don’t really have holidays this time of year, but they’re game for gathering anyway. Seven barely remembers celebrating anything, and the Doc has only ever had Prixin.” She deposited Phoebe’s surprisingly heavy box of cookies on the dining room table and crossed into the kitchen. “But everyone,  _ everyone _ , loves cookies.”

“Even the Vulcans?’ Frank asked as he sauntered into the kitchen.

Kathryn smiled. In the year she’d been back on Earth, she’d gotten to know her brother-in-law and found him to be a kind, easygoing man with a dry but gentle sense of humor. She liked him immensely, even though she couldn’t quite decide who he reminded her of. “Especially the Vulcans. But don’t tell them I said so.”

Frank gave a soft chuckle. “Coffee?”

“Help yourself,” Kathryn said, nodding toward the replicator. She crossed to the old-fashioned oven and peered inside. When she heard Phoebe enter the kitchen, she opened the oven door and pointed inside to a tray of eighteen picture-perfect sugar cookies. “And I’ll have you know, sister of mine, that I  _ can _ bake.”

Phoebe stared at the treats and shook her head. “Will wonders never cease?” Kathryn snapped a kitchen towel at her.

“So what’s in the yard for the kids?” Frank asked.

“Snow toys,” Kathryn said. She removed the tray from the oven and placed it on a cooling rack. “Snow brick molds, snowball launchers, snowshoes. Tom’s idea. I think he’s anxious for Miral to get old enough to use them. In the meantime, he’s got your kids, and Naomi, and Tuvok’s granddaughter.”

“Now all we need is … snow.” Phoebe peered out the kitchen window, to where a paltry amount of the white stuff barely covered the grass in the back yard.

Kathryn hummed her agreement. “Mom says we’re going to get half a foot later. And you know she’s always right about that.”

“True. Where is Mom, anyway?”

Kathryn fished green and red decorating sugars out of the cupboard. “She went over to the campus for a faculty lunch. She’ll be back in an hour or so. Help me with these cookies, you two.”

The kitchen, already full of the delicious scents of sugar and spice and coffee, soon warmed with the laughter of the three adults. “I’m impressed, Kathryn,” Phoebe teased. “Real, homemade cookies, not replicated. Of course, sugar cookies aren’t exactly  _ hard _ .”

Kathryn aimed an elbow at her sister’s ribcage. “And what did you bring?”

Frank gave a quiet laugh. Phoebe grinned. “Mini gingerbread houses.”

Kathryn gasped. “Six  _ dozen _ of them?”

Phoebe nodded. “Yep. Six dozen fully constructed and decorated gingerbread houses. They even have cutouts so you can perch them on the rim of a cup of cocoa.”

“I hate you.”

Phoebe smirked and sipped her coffee. “Invite an artist, get artsy cookies.”

With a sniff of disapproval, Kathryn began to divide her decorated sugar cookies – which, she reflected, did look fairly basic – into portions for the exchange.

“Did your mother make cookies?” Frank asked.

Kathryn nodded. “Peanut blossoms. They’re already in the dining room.”

Frank smiled in appreciation. “Oh, I do love those peanut blossoms.”

Phoebe helped Kathryn portion the last of Kathryn’s cookies into boxes. “So who all is coming today? You mentioned Tom and B’Elanna and Harry, Tuvok and his family, the Wildmans, Seven and the Doc … I feel like someone’s missing.”

Covering for her sudden nervousness, Kathryn grabbed as many cookie boxes as she could carry and headed for the dining room. She glanced back long enough to see her sister and brother-in-law exchange a significant look. To her chagrin, Phoebe followed her into the dining room with the rest of the cookie boxes.

“Kathryn?”

“Can you grab the candles and lighter from the sideboard?”

“You’re deflecting, Kathryn,” Phoebe said, but retrieved the items just the same.

“Deflecting what?”

Phoebe handed over the candles. “What does Chakotay celebrate this time of year?”

Kathryn’s face felt hot, and not from the tiny flames of the flickering candles. “Winter solstice,” she said softly. “And Prixin, of course.” She smiled to herself, remembering. “He was a good sport about everyone’s holidays and holy days. Sensitive to their needs around certain dates of the year.”

“Including you?”

Kathryn stared at her sister for a long moment. “Including me.”

“Sometimes … especially you, I imagine.”

“Sometimes.” Kathryn sighed. She replaced the lighter in the sideboard to give herself a little space from Phoebe’s insightful gaze. “It was a long time ago.”

“Not so long.” Phoebe appeared beside her. “I know things have been weird, but you invited him, right?” Kathryn nodded. “Is he coming?”

Kathryn refused to meet her eyes. “I’m actually not sure. I know he opened the invitation, but he never replied.”

Phoebe smiled. “I saw the way he waged war on the dessert stations at every one of those infernal Welcome Home events. The man has a killer sweet tooth, and this is the sweet season.” She gave Kathryn a quick hug. “He’ll be here.”

With that, she called to Frank. “Hey, Mister. How about we see about putting that fireplace to use?”

Grateful for the space, Kathryn leaned against the sideboard and closed her eyes. She hadn’t seen Chakotay in over a month, and their last meeting had been … strange. After six months at home, they’d both settled into new positions at Headquarters and the Academy and had tentatively started to reform the friendship that they’d somehow neglected and then misplaced in their last years in the Delta Quadrant. What started as a spontaneous coffee in the HQ commissary in July had turned into quick meetings for lunch at the cafes and bistros that ringed the Academy campus in August and several casual dinners in September and October. Thinking it was time to make the leap into the relationship she’d thought they both wanted, she’d taken him out for a gourmet dinner for his fiftieth birthday in November. If he’d been delighted by their dinner on Fisherman’s Wharf and thrilled with the Aran sweater with which she had presented him, he’d seemed positively gobsmacked by the kiss she’d given him at her front door.

Gobsmacked … or maybe blindsided.

He’d mumbled a hasty thank you and goodnight and disappeared into the San Francisco fog without a backward glance. She hadn’t heard from him since. The embarrassment and disappointment she felt at having misinterpreted his feelings were nothing compared to the despair Kathryn felt at having destroyed the friendship that had meant so much to her for so long, and that she had worked so hard to reclaim.

Kathryn sighed. Phoebe had nailed it in one. The cookie exchange wasn’t an old family tradition or an established Delta Quadrant gathering, or even something Kathryn would have considered before that disastrous non-date in November. It was bait for one person and one person only. Maybe he would turn up. Maybe he wouldn’t.

Either way, she was about to be descended upon by a healthy handful of her former crew. Chakotay or no Chakotay, it was time to put on a happy face and play the hostess.

“The sweet season,” indeed.

=/\=

Tom and B’Elanna and Miral were the first to arrive. B’Elanna handed over their cookie contribution – classic chocolate chip, predictably – and Tom immediately ducked into the backyard to examine the new snow toys, Miral perched on his hip.

The first flakes of the afternoon had just begun to fall when Harry and Libby – pistachio pudding cookies – turned up, followed by Tuvok, T’Pel, and T’Meni.

Gretchen led T’Meni to the backyard while Kathryn accepted the box of cookies from T’Pel. “These smell divine,” Kathryn said. “What kind are they?”

The Vulcans exchanged a glance. T’Pel cocked an eyebrow at her husband, who heaved an infinitesimal sigh. “Snickerdoodles,” Tuvok said gravely, and Kathryn let out a snort that she later blamed on the spiked punch B’Elanna had passed around moments earlier. The ridiculous word in her old friend’s mouth was just too much to bear.

By the time Seven and the Doc and the Wildmans turned up (chocolate brownie bites, lemon squares, double chocolate with sea salt), it was snowing in earnest, fat, wet flakes falling on the Indiana farmhouse and outbuildings. Soon the children, Miral in Naomi’s arms, all piled in from the backyard in search of warm drinks and warm hugs. Tom and Harry stayed outside in the snow. Standing at the kitchen sink, Kathryn used the sleeve of her sweater to wipe away the steam on the inside of the kitchen window. With a smile, she watched the two younger men experiment with the snow block makers until they’d found the perfect way to pack in the heavy, wet snow. Then they walked off a rough square and started laying snow blocks in the shape of two snow forts. Kathryn had no doubt that soon, there would be an epic snowball fight in the backyard of her mother’s house – much like the snowball fights she and Phoebe used to have with their cousins and any of the neighborhood kids who cared to turn up. Kathryn smiled, remembering the shifting loyalties of the massive winter wars that grew and morphed and eventually consumed the whole end of town.

While she stood there reminiscing, a third person strolled into the yard and joined Tom and Harry, a broad-shouldered man wrapped in a Starfleet-issue parka and fuzzy wool hat, a large box in hand.

Kathryn gasped. She’d recognize him anywhere, even in the gathering dark of a wintry afternoon.

The three men chatted for a moment, then Tom pointed to the back of the house. Across the expanse of the backyard, all three of them caught her staring out the kitchen window at them. Harry waved and pointed to Chakotay in an unmistakable and oblivious “Look who’s here!” gesture. Chakotay offered her a tentative smile. Tom winked at her, the pig.

When Chakotay turned and headed towards the back door, Kathryn darted to meet him, smoothing the front of her black slacks and red sweater. She took a deep, centering breath, and opened the door for him. “Professor,” she said. “Welcome to the Janeway homestead.”

“Thank you, Admiral.” He cleared his throat and handed her the box. “I brought my mother’s applesauce and cinnamon cookies. I hope that’s all right.”

“Perfect,” she said, turning away from him. “I’ll put them in the dining room with – “

Before she could take more than a half step away from him, his hand darted out to take her by the elbow. He gave the kitchen, where Tom and Harry were rummaging for alcohol, a nervous glance. “Do you think we could talk later?”

Kathryn nodded. “Of course. Actually … I wasn’t sure you’d even come.”

He removed his hat and ran a hand through his hair, mussing it even further than the hat had. “I wasn’t either.”

Kathryn’s heart dropped. “I see. Well then.”

But Chakotay took her elbow again. “For good reasons, Kathryn, not bad.” He hesitated, then bent to press a soft, lingering kiss to her cheek. When she blushed, he hit her with the devilish grin she’d loved for years. “All very good reasons that we need to talk about when all these people are gone.”

“Maybe I can get them all to leave now.”

He chuckled. “Not before I get my quota of everybody’s cookies. Go, Kathryn. Go be a good hostess and we’ll meet up later for a chat. I assume this old house has a fireplace?”

“It does.”

“I’ll meet you there.” When he shrugged out of his wet parka to reveal the sweater she’d given him for his birthday, she smiled and headed for the dining room with the box of applesauce and cinnamon cookies. She glanced back only once and watched him slip a small box wrapped in brown paper from the inside pocket of his coat into his trouser pocket, then hang his coat and hat on the hook by the back door where her father’s Starfleet-issue parka had always hung.

Something in her shifted and settled as softly as snow on snow.

=/\=

The party was a warm affair filled with laughter. More than once, Kathryn caught herself standing back to watch these people, her friends and family, enjoy each other in the beloved spaces of her childhood home. The adults passed Miral around while the older children played near the Christmas tree. Tom and Harry and the Doc bickered about the best design for a snow fort. Libby and Seven and T’Pel traded cookie recipes. Frank and the Doc bonded over their shared love of opera. B’Elanna kept sneaking cookies to Tuvok behind T’Pel’s back.

And in the midst of it all there was Chakotay doing what he’d always done: checking in on each grouping, offering a suggestion here and a corny joke there, and running a diversion for B’Elanna.

Kathryn couldn’t keep her eyes off him. He knew it, too, the cheeky bastard, and directed his warm gaze her way whenever he caught her staring.

Phoebe and Gretchen, recognizing her distraction, took charge of the party. They carried trays of appetizers throughout the gathering, organized the exchange of cookies, and kept everybody’s glasses full.

Darkness falls early in southern Indiana in December. Soon Miral became fussy and the older children began to tire of being on their best behavior, especially Tom and Harry, and the party broke up quickly. There were hugs all around, and promises to get together in the new year – preferably after there was enough snow to build a proper fort on the Janeway back lot.

By unspoken agreement, Kathryn and Chakotay both joined Gretchen in the kitchen to help clear away the dishes and leftover food, but Gretchen shooed them away. “It won’t take me a minute to get the dishes in the washer, and you don’t know how to do right anyway. You two go enjoy the last of the wine and the fire.”

“But Mom –”

“No. Go. I’ll finish this up, and then I’m going to bed.” She made a show of yawning. “I’m beat.”

Kathryn started to protest again, but Chakotay took her hand and tugged her toward the living room. “Come on, Kathryn. Do as your mother says.”

Gretchen handed her a bottle of wine. “You know where the glasses are. Good night.”

Hand-in-hand, they passed through the dining room for wine glasses and continued on into the living room. Gretchen’s Christmas tree, a towering thing covered in warm white lights and sparkling ornaments of every shape and size, glowed in the darkened room.

They sat together on a loveseat near the tree. Kathryn filled their glasses while Chakotay examined the tree, craning his neck to see all the way to the top. “So this is the Janeway tree.”

Kathryn tipped her glass to the sight. “This is it.”

“It’s exactly how I imagined it.”

She raised her eyebrows at him. “You imagined it?”

“Of course. It was hard not to, after hearing you describe it that first year.” He glanced around the room. “Actually, this whole place is how I imagined it. Warm, homey, comfortable. Full of love and light.” With his free hand, he tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “The kind of place that would make a strong and fearless starship Captain get a faraway look in her eyes. The kind of place my brave and beautiful Kathryn would call ‘home.’”

She caught his hand in hers. “Your Kathryn?”

He nodded. “If she’ll have me.”

“Why weren’t you sure if you’d come tonight?”

He sucked in a breath, one corner of his mouth turning up in a self-deprecating smile. “You kind of caught me by surprise last time we were together.”

“I scared the hell out of you, didn’t I?”

With a short bark of laughter, he slipped his hand from hers and rubbed his ear. Now that she was able to really take it in, Kathryn was mesmerized by the sight. “You terrified me, Kathryn. I didn’t know what to make of it. We’d finally managed to get our friendship back on what I thought was solid footing … and suddenly you’re kissing me.”

“I changed the parameters on you too suddenly.”

“You sure did.” He sipped his wine.

Kathryn nodded. “We should have talked first.”

“Maybe,” he conceded. “Or maybe it was exactly what I needed to jolt me out of my complacency.”

“What do you mean?”

He sighed and sat back on the loveseat, his eyes on the tree. “The last year out there … it was hard. For both of us.” She nodded. “And then, because I felt like I was losing my best friend, I made a ridiculous error in judgment.”

Kathryn smirked. “At least you realized it quickly.”

“Oh, we both did. About ten minutes after we disembarked, Seven and I couldn’t dump each other fast enough. She had a whole quadrant to explore, and I just wanted to stop moving for a while.” He took her hand and pressed it to his lips. “After I got settled at the Academy, I knew the next thing I wanted was to figure out how to get back in my friend’s good graces. And I felt like I was getting there. But then …”

“But then I jumped the gun on you.”

“You did.”

“Why did that terrify you?”

“Because I thought friendship was all I deserved from you, Kathryn. I though it was all you’d ever want from me, and if we moved forward, I might lose the most important friendship of my life.”

“I would never let that happen.”

“I know that now.”

“What made you change your mind?”

“Your invitation to this party.” He leaned forward, capturing her gaze. “I’m not a very bright man, but I finally realized that, in spite of what had happened on my birthday, or how foolish I’d been before that, you still wanted me to be here. You still wanted my friendship, no matter what. That means everything to me.” His brown eyes reflected the lights from the tree and sparkled like the stars of the Milky Way. “It’s the foundation for a relationship that I hope will last a very, very long time.”

She was forcefully reminded of many conversations in her Ready Room, when they’d sat together in exactly the same way, the attraction between them carefully unacknowledged. On a whim, she closed the distance between them and pressed a kiss to his lips. This time, he didn’t even hesitate. He pulled her close and kissed her back with such tenderness and promise, he took her breath away.

She leaned her forehead against his. “Wow.”

He chuckled and leaned into the corner of the couch, tucking her into his chest, his chin resting on her head. “Did you honestly think we’d be anything other than ‘wow,’ Kathryn?”

She giggled in a way that would have horrified the Admiralty. “Honestly? I’m pretty sure we’re going to be way past just ‘wow.’”

“Incredible?”

“Amazing.”

“Earth-shattering?”

She sat up enough to look him in the eye. “Quadrant-shattering.”

He laughed, a low rumble that rolled through her entire body and curled her toes. “Don’t get your hopes up, sweetheart. I’m an old man, you know.”

She tucked herself up under his chin again. “Fifty can’t be old. Because if fifty is old, forty-seven is practically old, and I won’t accept that.”

“Fair enough.” He shifted on the loveseat and fished in his pocket. “I know it’s not Christmas yet, but I brought something for you.”

He handed over the box wrapped in brown paper. She turned it in her hands once, then slipped her fingers into the seam of the paper, revealing a hinged black box. She glanced up at him uncertainly, and he smiled. Inside the box was a necklace, an abstract stone pendant hanging from a simple silver chain.

“Do you know what it is?”

She removed the necklace from the box and held it up to the light of the Christmas tree, turning it this way and that until she finally recognized the sweeping, graceful shape in profile against a sea of twinkling lights. She gasped. “It’s  _ Voyager _ .”

He nodded and took the necklace from her. “It’s stylized, of course, and not true to scale. But the hull is there, and the nacelle. Here.” She sat up enough to give him room to lower the pendant and fasten the chain behind her neck. “Those seven years weren’t always easy, but there was a lot of good in them, too. They were the best of my life. And  _ Voyager _ is where I met my best friend, and the one great love of my life.”

She turned and wrapped her arms around him, the avatar of their little ship pressed between their hearts. “I love you, too.”

They sat for a long time, simply enjoying the quiet and the peace and the warmth, until Kathryn’s eyelids started to droop. Chakotay stroked his hand down the middle of her back. “I should go.”

“Are you sure you want to go back out in the cold?”

Beneath her, he stilled. “Honestly, no.”

“Then don’t.”

“But your mother …”

“My mother will never say a word. She’ll be thrilled to make you breakfast in the morning.” Kathryn rose and held out her hands to him. “And it’s not like we’re a couple of teenagers sneaking around behind her back. We are positively middle-aged.”

“Speak for yourself.” But his knees popped when he levered himself off the loveseat, and they both laughed. “Fine. Middle-aged.”

She took his hand and started to lead him upstairs to her childhood bedroom, but he tugged her into the dining room first. “What are we doing? Bedroom’s upstairs.” she protested.

“We’re getting some of Tuvok’s snickerdoodles for later. They were amazing.”

Kathryn laughed. “Cookies in bed?”

“You have a problem with that?”

“No. Not in the least. It’s the sweet season, after all.”

-END-

**Author's Note:**

> "Why do you write like you're running out of time?"  
> Lin-Manuel Miranda, Hamilton
> 
> If you follow my tumblr, you know. I was diagnosed with terminal cancer in July of this year, which can go screw itself at its earliest convenience. My prognosis is anywhere from 18 months to 5+ years, but not much more than that. (Although I have high hopes for CRISPR, which is about to go into human trials for a type of cancer that's similar to mine.)
> 
> As I've been learning to live with this diagnosis, people keep telling me to do what I love for whatever time is left to me. Find my joy. So I bought an electric guitar, but because 2020 is a shitshow in a dumpster fire, I can't be in a band, which I love. There was no softball this summer, and I couldn't have played anyway, not while I'm undergoing chemo. I can't run anymore thanks to a weird heart condition caused by the chemo, and I can't even go to my favorite restaurants.
> 
> But I can write. So that's what I've been doing ... and I finally figured it out: This is what I love. THIS is my joy. 
> 
> Also, I miss my Mom and Dad, who passed in April of 2018 and July of 2020 (yes, you read that right; my Dad died one week before my diagnosis). I miss my sisters and brother and nieces and nephews and great-nieces and great-nephews, especially the one I haven't been able to meet yet. I won't be able to see them this Christmas (thanks again, 2020), and it's going to be hard to bear. 
> 
> Home, to me, is a farmhouse in central Indiana. So I took all those feelings and all those things I miss, and I translated them into this story. I hope you get a sense of what my family means to me when you read it.
> 
> Enjoy whatever you celebrate. Hug the people you love, even if it's virtually. Take care.  
> Laura


End file.
